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2017 Giro Rosa Stage 2 – videos, photos & more

After the Stage 1 Team Time Trial, Boels-Dolmans started in a super-strong position, 19 seconds ahead of their nearest rival. But Stage 2 looked perfect for riders to try to disrupt that narrative – pretty flat and uneventful for the first 94km, and then, at 30km to go, a 2nd Category climb, followed by a difficult, technical descent that looked perfect for breakaways. Would anyone get away from Boels?

I’ve got highlights videos, then the results, and below that reports, photos and even more videos and media. If you don’t want spoilers, scroll down carefully! As always, I’ll add more as I see it – and there will be a lot more to come!

Claudia Koster (VéloConcept) and Nicole Hanselmann (Cervélo-Bigla) had been out in a long 2-woman break, but were caught around 10km before the climb started – and then it all kicked off. Lucinda Brand (Sunweb) had lead up the first part of the climb, but then Annemiek Van Vleuten (ORICA-Scott) had attacked towards the top of the climb, and only Van der Breggen and Longo Borghini could follow her – and once they were away, AvV and ELB worked well together to make it to the finish, while Van der Breggen sat on.

They had a 1:49 gap to 5 chasers at 5km to go, with a group of around 15 behind them…

Tomorrow’s Stage 3 is only 100km long, and on paper looks like it’s one for the sprinters…. but this is the Giro, anything could happen! The stage will start at 12:15 CEST (11:15am UK BST, 6:15am USA EDT, 8:15pm Aussie AEST) and here’s my guide to following the action.